Battle over Mfuleni housing sites

Extension 5A has been a source of conflict for the past two years. The four role-players in the development are the Mfuleni Development Forum (MDF) — an umbrella body for Mfuleni’s various community organisations —, the Mfuleni Backyarders Ward 108 (Mfuleni Backyarders), Councillor Themba Honono (ANC) and the City of Cape Town.

The land has been earmarked for development, but there have been several occupations followed almost immediately by evictions. Extension 5A was originally meant for the Mfuleni Backyarders. According to documents that GroundUp has seen, the 275 serviced sites were meant to be allocated to 200 backyarders and 34 special needs cases. The rest were meant to be allocated to other recipients on the City’s housing database.

The dispute over who settles Extension 5A means that the land hasn’t been lived on for a long time. So on the weekend, people who were not from Ward 108 began to erect structures on the land. On Sunday the Mfuleni Backyarders reported the occupation to the Blue Downs police station. On Sunday night the occupation scaled up. On Monday morning, the ALIU arrived and began to evict people.

The dispute underlying the problems surrounding Extension 5A is between the Mfuleni Backyarders on the one side and the MDF and Honono on the other. The dispute is illuminated by the minutes of a meeting that was held on 9 September between the City and the MDF. The meeting discussed a revised allocation of the sites, but Mfuleni Backyarders were not invited to it. The minutes say that the list of 200 names submitted by Mfuleni Backyarders to the MDF will not be used because “it is not in line with the City’s allocation process”.

Honono said that the Mfuleni Backyarders was not invited to the meeting because, “they disrupted a meeting about two months ago.” He told GroundUp, “Because of their behaviour, the MDF took the decision” to not invite them to the meeting.

Bulelani Bota, the secretary of the Mfuleni Backyarders, claims that the MDF asked the backyarders to sign the attendance register for the meeting and then told them that they must leave the meeting as Honono was not able to make it. Bota said that the Mfuleni Backyarders wanted their members’ names removed from the register to ensure that any decisions taken after they left would not be seen to be accepted by them, but, Bota claims, the MDF refused. Bota believes that Honono is trying to enforce ANC policy in the allocation of the sites.

Bota claims that the MDF agreed to the original allocation list, but then about three days after it was submitted to the City, “I received a call from Councillor Honono stating that there is a mistake” and the process had to stopped.

Benedicta van Minnen, the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Human Settlements, said that the City only learned about the disagreement between the MDF and the Mfuleni Backyarders after the 9 September meeting and they are calling another meeting to inform all roleplayers of the allocation process.

The notes of a meeting that took place on 31 March 2015 attended by the Mfuleni Backyarders, MDF and Honono say that both the MDF and Honono “confirmed that they agree with the allocation of the 200 individuals from the database.”

“Why were we asked to send them [the list] but they can’t be used today?” asked Bota. “Everything we do, we do it in writing because at some point it comes to corruption … we are the committee for the structure, we know the people [in the community], we talk to them, we meet with them every Saturday.”

Honono said that there was never an agreed list of 200 beneficiaries. “The City of Cape Town has a housing policy, it is not working from any list from any individual,” said Honono. He said that the list of 200 beneficiaries was submitted to check whether it correlated with the City’s database. “They [Mfuleni Backyarders] are not the only backyarders’ [organisation]. There are many [other[ backyarders for many years [in Mfuleni]. We are not favouring anyone,” he said.

In a meeting called on Tuesday evening the Mfuleni Backyarders were promised that they would receive a recap of the 9 September meeting and that 350 names will be used to extract 200 eligible beneficiaries according to the time when an individual registered. It remains unclear as to whether the list is to be the same as the one originally submitted by the Mfuleni Backyarders.

Allegations have also emerged that people are selling the plots for R7,500 a site. Bota said that he wants an audit to be done to ensure that the sites are not being sold and that the people who are currently occupying the land are actually on the list. In response, Honono said that he had also heard these allegations and had also heard that he himself is selling sites. He said that no one can sell their site because the land belongs to the City.

Bota said that the people who have been occupying the land since last year may be backyarders but this has not been determined yet. He says that he thinks those who are already there should be allowed to stay but it must be determined whether they are backyarders in ward 108 and whether they are on the housing database as all beneficiaries are supposed to be.